


a dream

by Milee_Cosgrove



Series: Circles [2]
Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: Angst, Deleted Scene, F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-16
Updated: 2017-05-16
Packaged: 2018-11-01 13:33:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 886
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10922811
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Milee_Cosgrove/pseuds/Milee_Cosgrove
Summary: Solas goes to Ostwick to look for her.





	a dream

**Author's Note:**

> A deleted scene: what happened in the bad future when Solas went to Ostwick.

He smells the city before he sees it.

Burning metal and wood, the sickly scent of rot, and the tang of the nearby water.

He is not sure why he came here. He visited the tower of Ostwick and found it destroyed; not a surprise, considering how many spirits must have been dragged forcibly there for harrowings. When the Veil was sundered, they must have come back to tear the tower apart, stone by cracked stone.

The city of Ostwick fared little better. When the Veil tore, there must have been a large opening here. He can see the wreckage of houses and other buildings. What looks to be a Chantry is still burning, smoke trailing into a sickly green sky.

He should not have come.

Even so, he cannot bring himself to turn away. Not yet.

He casts wards about himself, ensures he will not be disturbed, and then Solas unrolls a blanket and settles upon it. He closes his eyes and tries to sleep.

When he dreams, he sees the city as it once was. The memories are still here, just waiting for someone to find them. Houses and businesses, docks and boats, many feet over worn cobblestones. And a thin, slip of a girl weaving through the crowds. A flash of sunlight on dark hair as she darts to a cart bearing sweets. A coin is handed over, and the girl walks away with a bun bursting with cinnamon and roasted nuts.

She is so young. Missing a front tooth, and he knows it because she is smiling so broadly. She takes her sweet bun to the docks, where she fends off the attention of gulls. She finds a piece of driftwood, tosses it into the waves just to watch it float away.

He wakes abruptly, with her name on his lips. He has not spoken it, not since he lost her in Redcliffe.

Heart throbbing, he sees what has awoken him. What crossed his wards.

It’s a stray cat. Not Fennel—no, he has not seen Fennel in nearly a year. Haven was among the first places that Corypheus destroyed. Solas can only hope the cat escaped into the forest.

This cat has a burned ear and is painfully thin. It eyes Solas warily.

She would have tried to catch it. To lure it with food and then use her clumsy healing spells to ease its pain.

_Look at it. We can’t just walk away, can we?_

Even now, he can hear what she would have said and how she would have said it. He rarely allows himself the luxury of indulging his own grief; he has far too many lives depending on him. There is no time for despair.

But perhaps there are a few moment’s for compassion’s sake.

He reaches into his pack, finds what dried meat he can. There isn’t much, but he places a few strips on the ground.

The cat makes an uncertain sound; it takes a step toward him, and then another, gauging his response. When Solas does not move, the cat lunges for the food, dragging it out of Solas’s reach before devouring it.

Hoping the food will be enough of a distraction, Solas edges toward the cat. He can at least fix that festering wound on its ear. But when he moves closer, the cat drops the food and begins to run.

Right into the arms of a boy.

He wears an overlarge hat, and he is dressed in leathers and rags. His fingers are stained with soot, as if he has been digging through the rubble.

With a mrowl of anger, the cat tries to scratch. But the boy whispers something, his voice low, his head bowed over the cat. The creature’s struggles relax, and it goes still. It looks at the boy, but it does not try to escape again.

The boy walks to Solas. “He will let you heal him now,” he says, and his voice has the distracted tone of a dreamer. As if he is not wholly here nor there. “He was—scared. Large and looming, a shadow falling over him.”

Solas hesitates, then touches the cat’s cheek. It is a simple matter to heal the wound, to drive out the infection, and to ease the pain of more aches and bruises.

The boy sets the cat gently on his feet. It darts for the food a second time.

“You came here looking for her,” says the boy. “A shadow of what might have been. Soft fur, a warm fire, her voice like a cloak wrapped around you. You wanted that life, but you got this instead.”

Not a boy.

Not a mortal at all.

“What do you know of me?” asks Solas.

“Only what you know of yourself.” The spirit does not look at him directly; its gaze is hidden by the hat. “Fingers enclosed in steel claws, cannot touch another for fear of splitting them open. Incense heavy in the air, a bed of silk that has long-since rotted away. Waking—the world is wrong—it is too harsh, too bright, and the drag of it is too much to bear.”

“Who are you?” asks Solas quietly.

A lift of the chin, and Solas catches a glimpse of hollow shadows beneath deep-set eyes. “My name is Cole.”


End file.
